22 replies to this topic

[Ed Of The 3rd Kind]

I was talking with Yoda_ a while back and the topic of reviving the heroes came up. While I believe in an RTS it is necessary to have a revival system in place I'm not so sure that it's a bad idea to have unrevivable characters. In that the more you upgrade your character the more powerful your hero becomes, provided you are being strategic with your unit it shouldn't die, this would prevent hero battles where there are just heroes going at it which used to happen so often in BFME matches. The idea of unrevivable units adds a depth of realism to the playing experience, creates excitement, draws the player into micro management and forces the player to think about strategy and tactics and what heroes to use where. When it comes to Star Wars games in the past with the exception of one or two games out of the Aladdins cave of Star Wars games you never had to think or strategise. Even in EAW strategy never really mattered, you never had to think about your units and alot of the time the units AI would fire any special powers for you anyway, I'm not knocking the game in any way but it could have been alot more engrossing.

Secondly, I know this going to sound lame but I had a notion that if people didn't like the idea of unrevivable units, that we could have revivable units in the form of force ghosts, these would not be able to attack but would offer huge buffs to other units in game. This would only be available to a select few Jedi/Sith and would be in keeping with the Star Wars vibe.

Thirdly if that doesn't go down too well, screw it all and just keep the revivables.

Edited by Ed Of The 3rd Kind, 15 June 2009 - 07:16 PM.

[Crusard]

Between revivable or not, I'd say wait for the first acceptably "playable" version and do some empirical tests.

The ghost idea sounds a bit fragile. I imagine you're aiming at an OCL when dead behavior?
First I'm not sure how ghosts could take damage (they should be killable but, by who?), and having a battlefield full of ghosts in a late game sounds pretty bad to me

[Devon]

Yeah, revivable or non, but no ghosts

[Ed Of The 3rd Kind]

The idea of that in itself is of course weak, the ghosts I think would be damageable by force energy, the battelfield would not be full of Force Ghosts, just the select few that we have seen resurrected like Obi Wan & Yoda possibly Anakin but I would say no to that considering the timeframe. I mean when you look at it in terms of LOTR the AOTD could not be killed because they are non corporeal entities that could in spite of this interact on a physical level. In the scope of the game universe they were however killable because having a unit that is immortal in a game completely screws things up.

The OCL would spawn a new unit that cannot attack but is susceptible to being attacked, it would be more susceptible to force damage than pierce i.e. lazer but could still be killed off entirely if there were great enough numbers. It's merely so that there is no complete destruction of the unit, I don't want people getting annoyed with the lack of their hero although admittedly it will be through their own carelessness, a well used Jedi Hero should not die. We intend on having the Jedi specialise in different areas drawing information that we gather from the prequels and biography's if needs be.

I myself am more on the side of them not respawning and just dying outright, it might frustrate people who can't manage armies and heroes but what it will encourage is greater care to be taken in using the units and in discovering the units weaknesses and strengths.

[Devon]

I'd rather not do ghosts But like Crusard said, we can test the balance of revivable vs nonrevivable when we have a decent build.

[Annullus The Grey]

well palpatine should be able to clone himself then

[Ed Of The 3rd Kind]

that never happened as far as I'm concerned

[Grizzlez]

You could make a heroes cost increase each time it dies to keep the strategic element of not just using your hero and still allow players to recruit them. Although non-reviveable heroes sounds like the most sensible in terms of realism, imagine losing Yoda or Obi Wan and then having Palpatine constantly own your armies because you have no decent hero to stand up against them.

[Ed Of The 3rd Kind]

Ya, a cost increase would most likely be the method to go with if we are going to have revivables.

The Non-Revivable system could be annoying for some players but overall I think it would offer the most in terms of getting the player involved. Games would be more intense because you can't just own everything with your heroes, in fact a wise player would gain sneaky level ups from holding back on the heroes and attacking creeps and then going into battle with the level up upgrades. Regardless, if a player is careless enough to lose heroes like Yoda or Palpatine most likely they deserve to get their ass kicked seeing as they will have just killed and most likely badly utilised two of the strongest heroes in game.

[Crusard]

Or... players would be forced into using heroes very shyly in a very lame way. Remember that pretty much all units in this mod are ranged, which makes it VERY easy to target and kill heroes. Now that I think of it, not having revives is nearly unthinkable
Maybe making Jedis/Sith resist ranged attacks? Then we have invincible jedis and a bunch of anti-hero heroes!
Now if we think of our customizable jedis, I can already imagine everyone picking defense/healing skills so they don't kill their so valuable non-revivable heroes

My vote goes for REVIVABLES.

Now there's still the issue of ranged units vs heroes... this is going to be harder than I thought

[Jeth Calark]

Just keep the revivability, but definitely implement a cost system (which is already used for the vanilla BFME II heroes I think....I know that it is used in BFME I).

[Ed Of The 3rd Kind]

It makes sense that Jedi/Sith would be able to resist lazers due to them deflecting them for the most part in the movies, if we could make FX to show this it would be great, and if we could trigger a defensive anim it'd be great so it would look as if they are actively deflecting the blasters.

[Crusard]

It makes sense that Jedi/Sith would be able to resist lazers due to them deflecting them for the most part in the movies, if we could make FX to show this it would be great, and if we could trigger a defensive anim it'd be great so it would look as if they are actively deflecting the blasters.

Do you remember in the third movie, when the "kill all jedi" command was given to the clones? Jedis could deflect a laser or two, but they were eventually outgunned and killed. A single battalion of droids (or clone troopers) would easily pwn a single jedi in "real life".
Now about the animations, it can be achieved through the damage animation, but if the unit is moving or hitting (which is 99,9% of the time in a battle) it won't physically have time to deflect at the same time.

[Devon]

Do you remember in the third movie, when the "kill all jedi" command was given to the clones? Jedis could deflect a laser or two, but they were eventually outgunned and killed. A single battalion of droids (or clone troopers) would easily pwn a single jedi in "real life".

I think that's different...that was a totally unexpected attack by the troopers the Jedi thought would obey them to the death If you look at some of the actual battles when the Jedi know it's coming, they do a lot better.

[Allathar]

I'd say 'no revives'. Remember, if it doesn't work in-game, it can always be changed.

[Taralom]

I think that's different...that was a totally unexpected attack by the troopers the Jedi thought would obey them to the death If you look at some of the actual battles when the Jedi know it's coming, they do a lot better.

Yet, Ki-Adi-Mundi was victorious, had the time to think "What in the name of..." when the clones aimed at him and was still killed in three seconds.
Order 66 was one of the, if not the worst scene in the Revenge of the Sith movie, simply because of the fact that each and every jedi was executed waaaaaaaay too fast.

OT: Aren't Jedi able to "force-run"? Like, moving around the battlefield with suberb speed? That could provide the answer to the distance when in ranged combat.

*I vote no-revives, because of the originality of the concept*

[Annullus The Grey]

i personally would like to to make the jedi heros such beasts that revies are unneeded if you are slightly competant but im sure yoda and ed will drag me back before i get that far so i guess i have to vote for revivable :(

[Ed Of The 3rd Kind]

Making the jedi unstoppable beasts would require no skill and the novelty would wear thin very quickly, having jedi with limited powers would require a more competant player to make better decisions in the use of their Jedi. Jedi were not unstoppable anyway, they were just as fragile as every other lifeform, the difference is they were better equipped for survival.

[Gfire]

Can you make it so they deflect lasers back and can actually hit guys with them?

[Devon]

Hopefully